Taken: A 'Dark Skies' Story
by Aaron Ledgers
Summary: In this world, millions of children have gone missing over a slow span of many years. Out of every child, none have ever returned aside from one: Alice Thompson disappeared from her home and mysteriously reappeared three years later, but she doesn't remember what happened to her, and she doesn't look a day older than when she left. And even worse... she just might be Taken again.
1. Prologue: It Began with a Prank

**Prologue: It Began with a Prank**

This story begins with an old woman sitting in a rocking chair.

At a first glance, she was a fairly old soul, and she was also very grandmotherly in appearance: you could picture her as a woman who always bakes cookies, or the old lady who never fails to wave at the neighborhood children while she lovingly tends to her garden. At the moment, however, Old Aggie wasn't smiling... nor was she baking, gardening, or even acting grandmotherly.

She was reading a newspaper with tears in her eyes.

Ever so slowly, she took her glasses off just as the wet trails spilled down her weathered cheeks: almost as though she were at a funeral, she picked up a pair of nearby scissors and began cutting something out of the news article. Then she picked it up, and slowly rose to her feet, shuffling over to the locked door at the end of the hall. Once again... it had happened. Once again, a battle had been lost. And once again... Old Aggie found herself standing in her study, examining the smiling face of yet another child who'd vanished.

She knew that the girl would most likely never return, since none of them ever did.

Once Taken, nobody ever came back.

However, this case had been the most heart-jerking one she'd had in years, since the girl's parents had frantically come to visit her in an attempt to find out what was going on inside their home. It had all begun one afternoon when James and Cecelia Thompson had knocked on her front door, claiming to be needing her 'expertise' as they'd called it. It wasn't anything new: nearly seventy thousand people had come to her over a long stretch of many years, looking for the same discreet help.

Once they'd explained their story, she'd known that They had come around again.

According to Mrs. Thompson, it had first begun in the middle of the night on a Saturday: she'd woken up without knowing why and had gone down into the kitchen to find all of their food supplies stacked from floor to ceiling in odd, geometrical manners. When she'd turned the lights on, several appliances had turned on as well, which had illuminated some patterns on the ceiling. After that, their teenage daughter started having nightmares about someone being in her room, and all three of them had begun suffering from black-outs, disturbing behavior, and savage nosebleeds. Their daughter, Alice, had become violently ill for almost three weeks.

Then... the odd situations became public since four migrations of geese, sparrows, and several other birds flew clean into their home.

They'd pelted the house in a mass frenzy, one after the other, smashing their little skulls and killing themselves.

Later that afternoon, the birds had been cleaned off their lawn in piles, but little blood spots had been all over their home.

That was why the Thompson family had finally come to see her.

In truth, they'd been skeptical about everything until she'd forced them to take a small test... but after that, they'd listened to her warnings. And because of what she'd told them, they'd obviously chosen to fight back: they'd definitely tried their hardest to avoid the inevitable. The proof of that had been in the paper, since there had been photos of the Thompson home completely boarded up.

However, just like all the other families... they hadn't been able to win, and their daughter had gone missing.

The only thing that would remain would be the smiling photo of the fifteen-year-old girl who was now taped on her wall. The wall that also held over sixty thousand other smiling faces, dating all the way back to the late nineteen thirties, when her twin sister had been Taken right in front of her and she'd become aware of Their existence. Her sister hadn't come back, either... there hadn't even been a glimmer of hope. The old woman slowly closed her eyes and shivered despite the heat of the afternoon.

This last vanishing had by far been the worst... mostly because she'd had a little hope that a family might be able to defy Them for once.

However, she had learned over twenty years ago that once someone was chosen, they would be Taken no matter what. It didn't matter how much a family struggled... it didn't matter how much they tried to resist... it didn't matter what lengths they took to keep their precious loved ones safe... because in the end, the person they were trying to protect always disappeared.

This new face would decorate her wall with all the rest... the face of a girl with long blonde hair and a soft smile that didn't touch her large blue eyes: this girl had been sheltered greatly because of how much her parents had loved her. She had also been beautiful, but that didn't matter now: she was gone, most likely for the rest of her life. Aggie believed that this family had probably come closest to beating Them and getting their happy ending... but in the end, They had taken the Thompson's daughter just like all the others.

Even though Aggie had given up a long time ago, she still wanted to fight... to do something... anything... but it was hopeless.

A human cannot fight what it cannot comprehend.

"It's been a long seventy-three years, Abigale." she whispered sadly, shuffling into her room and closing the door on her study. "There's nothing more I can do._"_

That being said, she made her morning coffee and sat back down in her rocking chair, refusing to think about this latest disappearance.

After all, there really was nothing she could do: the Thompson daughter had been Taken... and like all the others, she would never return.

Or so the old woman thought.


	2. Chapter 1: The Girl in White

**Chapter One: The Girl in White  
><span>**

Levon Brown sighed as he killed the ignition to his semi before rubbing his tired eyes and opening the door.

Letting out a weary yawn, the burly man hopped out of the vehicle and headed for the gas station he'd pulled up in front of, planning to grab some snacks and sleep for the rest of the night. He'd been driving for a total of seventeen hours, and since he'd hit his driving limit, he wasn't really able to go any farther because of how the company rules worked.

Plus, since it was already three in the morning, he was dead tired.

The trucker cracked his back and rolled his broad shoulders before walking into the BP, waving at the man who was standing behind the cash register.

"Hello!" the store-keeper called, giving him a delighted smile. "Long drive, I'm guessing?"

"I'm a trucker, and it's three in the morning: how'd ya guess?" Levon wearily grunted, southern accent coming out much more pronounced than he really wanted it to; after a moment, however, he flicked the front of his cap up and browsed the shelves for some snacks and bottled water. "I've used up my hours for the day, so I can't go any further. Mind if I crash in your lot for the night?"

"Not at all, sir," the cashier chuckled, giving him a little shrug. "You're the first person I've seen in two days: we're out in the middle of nowhere."

"Damn straight we are," Levon snorted, rolling his fierce brown eyes. "Nothin' but mountains, mountains, and more godforsaken mountains."

"Yup! Anyway, my name is Mr. Patel," the cashier sighed, making Levon quirk an eyebrow; the little man was obviously company-starved. "What's yours?"

"Levon," the trucker grumbled, giving him a small smile. "I have a serious question, though: how many more miles do I have to drive until I hit the next town?"

"Well, about seventy... going both ways," the Hispanic man dejectedly muttered, shaking his head with a tut-tutting sound. "I live in a nearby cottage, so that's why I work here... but I can only talk to the store manager through the payphone since he can't be bothered with coming all the way here most of the time. On top of that, this is probably the most vulnerable store in the entire state of South Carolina!"

"I wouldn't go broadcasting that to random strangers if I were you," the trucker choked, letting out a booming laugh. "Someone might use that against ya!"

"Well, most truckers are a friendly sort," Mr. Patel sighed, quirking an eyebrow. "If you catch my drift."

"Depends on what sort of friendly you're into," the man chuckled, giving him a sly smile. "Wouldn't mind some company."

However, before anything else could be said, the automatic doors slid open again and a flurry of dead leaves skittered across the cracked linoleum floor.

Those leaves also brushed against a set of small, dirt-covered feet that halted just inside the building's interior.

Mr. Patel instantly glanced over Levon's shoulder, but his flirty expression went slack when he realized that a young girl wearing a white nightgown had walked inside the store. Her extremely pale skin gleamed in the fluorescent lights above her, and her matted thigh-length hair was billowing around her slender form in stringy tendrils.

She looked, for all the world, like something clean out of a Stephen King movie.

After taking note of the store-keeper's startled expression, Levon slowly craned his neck around and followed the man's gaze.

However, his bushy eyebrows immediately lifted clean into his hat.

"Well, now... this is an interesting development," Levon muttered, squinting at the girl with a surprised expression before he scratched at his beard and sighed. "I got a boy around her age. About fourteen or fifteen, I guess. She won't give you no trouble. I think I'll get a warm coffee, too. How much?"

"Six... fifty-four," Mr. Patel stated slowly, not taking his eyes off the girl. "No taxes. Still, I'm thinking you don't know much about trouble: my cousin in Mississippi has been robbed twice by youngsters who weren't much older than that girl."

"Really?!" Levon snorted, eyes widening in surprise as he digested that. "I swear, makes you wonder what in tarnation their folks are up to. Take this one, for instance: it's three in the mornin', and her she is roaming out by her lonesome. In her bare feet, no less."

"Something's not right," the cashier muttered, eying the girl with an intense frown. "Do you think she could be on drugs?"

It was true that something about her was definitely odd.

The girl's extremely light blue irises were completely blank and unresponsive to the world around her.

In truth, she didn't even seem to be aware of their conversation.

"I don't know what her deal is," Levon stated gruffly, turning his brown eyes on the cashier, "but if I ever caught my boy out of the house this time of night, I'd wear him out good."

"Wear him out?" Mr. Patel asked, forehead puckering in confusion. "What do you mean?"

"I mean, he'd get a whuppin'," the burly of the two carefully reiterated, glancing at the pale girl again. "Better that than having him wandering around where any random pervert could get to him."

"Where did she come from?" the cashier wondered, biting his lip. "There aren't any residences, and I don't see any other cars out there."

For a long moment, the two of them examined the girl more closely. Her hair was extremely and ridiculously long, but it obviously hadn't been washed in days: it was so lank and dirty that it could have been any color from dark chestnut to platinum blonde. On top of that, the nightgown she was wearing was absolutely filthy.

After a moment of carefully turning her head back and forth, the girl almost robotically moved forward and wandered down one of the aisles of the convenience store. She slowly rotated her head from side to side as she walked, almost as though she were searching the shelves for a can of soup or a box of crackers that her mother might have sent her for. However, her eyes were still blank: twin blue mirrors that reflected everything... yet saw nothing.

"There's something funny about her," Levon stated calmly, watching as the girl practically glided across the floor; his styrofoam cup of coffee was resting in his hand, cooling off and completely forgotten. "I don't like it. I've got a weird feeling in my belly right now."

Mr. Patel jumped when the girl unexpectedly halted mid-step, since the motion was unexpectedly abrupt.

However, _both_ men stiffened with identical expressions of alarm when the girl's head twitched in a spastic manner: her shoulders soon locked up and she went rigid, head tilting back and locking in place. Not long after that, her hands shot out to the sides despite the rigid, parallel position of her arms, and her fingers began curling into claws that scratched at the air. For several moments, the girl seemed to be having a seizure of some sort, and her mouth opened wide.

"Dear God," Levon whispered, eyes widening to the size of marbles when he realized that the girl's nose had started bleeding. "Oh, lord... what the hell?!"

"Do we need to call an ambulance?!" Mr. Patel squeaked, eyes just as large. "She's bleeding!"

"Obviously!" the trucker squalled, waving his hands. "It's gushing out of her like a waterfall!"

However, before either of them could continue, the girl's seizing stopped and her expression returned.

For several moments, she did nothing but blink... lids jerking open and shut as if there were some kind of electrical short circuit in the nerves to her eyes. Then, in spite of the blood that had literally just gushed out of her nose like a tap faucet and coated the front of her filthy white dress, the pale girl once again began walking down the aisle.

"I am thinking she's on drugs," Mr. Patel whispered, sliding a quarter out of the cash register and edging towards the pay-phone on the wall. "Keep her busy while I call the authorities and an ambulance, just in case."

Levon nodded and slowly began to follow the girl into the aisle.

Then he stopped and watched as she slowly walked towards the glass-fronted refrigerator cases in the back. The coolers held several galleons of milk as well as a few milk cartons, juice bottles, sodas, beers, and energy drinks. The trucker frowned and tilted his head to the side, trying to get a better look at what she was doing. In truth, the girl was walking almost like some sort of robot: she was too stiff and too... well, lifeless, oddly enough.

However, the trucker's eyes widened when the girl stopped in front of the dairy case and reached for the handle... but then she stared at her arm and blinked, almost as if she'd never seen her own body before. Mr. Patel, however, immediately slammed the quarter on the counter and marched towards her, waving his arms.

"Don't even think about it!" the man yelped; however, when the girl slowly turned to face him, he froze at the sight of her glassy, vacant eyes. In truth, they were so light in color that they almost resembled ice. However, she wasn't looking at him despite the fact that she was facing him; it was almost as though she were looking through him. "Just go! Leave right now! I don't want you getting anymore blood in here!"

The girl stared through him for another moment, eyes unresponsive... but then she robotically turned away and grabbed a quart of milk off the shelf. When she slowly lifted her hand to the top of the spout, Mr. Patel lunged forward and tried to take it from her. He succeeded a little too well: the force of his jerk literally yanked the girl away from the fridge and spun her around like a top. The man squealed when she stumbled and limply crashed into his chest.

"Ew! She's getting blood on me!" the man cried, jumping away from her; the girl slowly righted herself and vacantly looked around in that same robotic manner; however, when her eyes fell upon the milk carton in his hands, she slowly moved forward and lifted her hands toward it, not even noticing that he'd raised it out of her reach. "What on earth is wrong with this child?!"

Levon was speechless.

In all his years as a trucker and a father, he'd never seen something so strange, not even on the internet.

The girl in front of him was literally just standing there, slowly waving her arms in the direction of a milk carton that was being held only a few inches out of her reach. In truth, all she really needed to do was jump in order to take the milk carton back, but she didn't seem to be capable of comprehending that.

She was merely staring at it and waving her arms... like an infant.

"Give it to her," Levon stated seriously, making the cashier gawk in horror. "Don't worry, I'll pay... but something is obviously wrong with her, and judging by how much blood she just lost through her nose, we should be helping her right now."

After a moment, the man slowly lowered his arm and the girl's small hands closed around the carton. When she began picking at the top of the carton, Mr. Patel took it back and reluctantly opened it for her. Then he stepped away and watched as she lifted the carton to her mouth.

The moment she took a drink, her pupils dilated and she choked: Levon's eyes widened in horror when she collapsed, falling to the ground like a puppet who'd just had her strings cut. The waxed carton hit the linoleum and burst open, flooding the floor with milk: Levon instantly bolted to her side and squatted beside her.

After a moment, he checked her pulse and sighed in relief.

"Musta passed out from the blood loss," the trucker stated, glancing at the cashier. "Go call an ambulance and get the police up here."

"O-okay," Mr. Patel squeaked, hurrying over to the pay phone and dialing 911. "I'm calling now."

While the storekeeper was doing that, Levon righted the carton and stood up to go grab some napkins out of his truck. However, that's when he noticed something on the milk carton and froze, brows furrowing in a dark manner. For several moments, he glanced between the container in his hand and the girl who was lying unconscious in the spreading pool of milk. Then he rubbed his eyes and looked closer, not believing what he was seeing.

A beautiful teenage girl with abnormally light eyes and luscious hair was grinning out of a grainy, black-and-white photograph under the logo of a smiling cow. Feeling his face draining of color, the man read the description that had been printed on the back of the milk carton, heart speeding up in spite of his rationalizations.

**MISSING:  
><strong>_NAME: Alice Marie Thompson_  
><em>HOMETOWN: Dansville, VA<em>  
><em>AGE: 15 at time of disappearance; now 18.<em>  
><em>HEIGHT: 4'7"<em>  
><em>WEIGHT: 93 lbs<em>  
><em>EYES: extremely light blue; almost clear.<em>  
><em>HAIR: blonde, straight, around hip-length<em>  
><em>TYPE: Presumed Kidnapping<em>  
><em>DETAILS: Disappeared from family home in<em>  
><em>the middle of the night. Last seen wearing a white<em>  
><em>nightgown with small teddy bears around the hem.<em>

For several moments, the man's mind went blank... but then, Levon paled even further and he hastily crawled back over to the unconscious girl. With shaking hands, he lifted up the hem of her skirt and examining it with frantic brown eyes: shockingly enough, underneath the layers of grass and dirt, there really _were_ teddy bears on her nightgown. His mouth immediately fell open and his eyes practically bugged out of his skull.

"Dear God," Levon whispered, leaning back and staring at her in shock. "This is a lost girl."

"Hold on a minute!" Mr. Patel stated into the phone, then covered the receiver with one hand. "What did you say?"

"This girl's face is on the back of this milk carton," the trucker bellowed, standing up with enormous eyes. "She was kidnapped!"

Mr. Patel's eyes widened as well and he uncovered the phone.

"Get the sheriff over here, too," the storekeeper stated firmly. "I now have cause to believe that the child might have actually been kidnapped at some point."

With that, he hung up and watched as Leven slowly knelt down beside the girl, chewing on his nails in anxiety. The trucker clamped a beefy hand on the girl's shoulders with a tenderness that belied his size. After a moment, he tossed the carton over to the cashier and glanced up when he caught it; then he glanced at the picture and frowned.

"I remember this," he stated in confusion. "It was all over the news. That story was an odd one, indeed."

"Odd?" Levon demanded, blinking at the Hispanic man in confusion. "What do you mean? Wasn't it just a kidnapping?"

"Well, nobody thought so at first," Mr. Patel explained, gesturing at the milk carton. "As it turns out, everyone thought that the girl's parents had gone a little off their rocker about a few weeks before she disappeared. Plus, there was another news article about flocks of birds flying into the house this girl lived in. When the parents were taken to court for suspected murder, they hired some lawyers and fought bacl. Then, once everything was cleared up, the sent out an amber alert and reporters came to talk to them from all over the country."

"How long ago was that?" the trucker demanded, staring at him with a taught mouth. "I don't remember hearing anything about it."

Mr. Patel blinked and consulted the milk carton.

"It's been a little more than three years now," the cashier stated, frowning as well. "What on earth?"

"You mighta made a mistake," Levon stated firmly. "This can't be right."

"No, no, I am very certain," Mr. Patel retorted, folding his arms across his chest. "I remember everything big: it was three years ago."

"Well, according to that missing poster, the Thompson girl should be eighteen now!" Levon persistered, shaking his head. "Does this kid look that old to you?!"

"What makes you so sure?" Mr. Patel asked, staring at him with curious eyes. "Why do you think I'm wrong?"

"Because it's obvious!" the trucker stated fiercely, gesturing at the girl lying on the ground. "This can't be the same girl! She don't look no older than the kid in the picture! Don't you get it?! It's been three entire years: she oughta look different!"

Mr. Patel made a clucking noise deep in his throat and backed away, not knowing how to respond.

Sirens wailed in the distance.

Levon scraped his hand over his unshaven face and shook his head.

_Looks like I'm not getting any sleep tonight,_ he thought mournfully, then adjusted his jeans. _There goes getting some nice 'company'._

However, despite his disgruntled aggravation, he couldn't help but wonder what the hell was really going on. Because it was true: the girl in front of him was definitely the one in the picture, but somehow, she didn't look a damn day older than when the photo had been taken. When the ambulance pulled in with a cop car close behind, the trucker sighed in dismay.

"This is gonna be a long night," he muttered, jerking his cap down in front of his eyes. "Faaaack."


End file.
